Maah Daah Hey Trail Run, Saturday, July 28th

trevize1138

Barefooters
Jun 20, 2017
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Minnesota
A year ago I DNFed the marathon distance:

https://www.thebarefootrunners.org/threads/maah-daah-hey-100-my-first-marathon-trail-run-dnf.20685/

I'm back for more abuse this year! My fingers are crossed that the forecast doesn't take a drastic turn. Currently predicting a high of 77F! That'd be a dream out there, especially considering the heat of last year.

Looking back at last year and with what I've learned since then I'm confident there were two things (beyond the heat) that caused my DNF:

* I drank way too much straight water and suffered hyponatremia. All the symptoms were there including feeling increasingly thirsty and more water was only making me thirstier.
* Heed makes me feel bad. I've since switched to Tailwind and it's much better.

I've since completed a road marathon unshod and a 50K trail marathon in my Luna Roots Origens and am a lot more confident in my long-distance abilities. I'm at least smarter than I was a year ago. With the cooler weather I'm going to attempt this one unshod but pack my huaraches just in case. Will post a race report here, of course.

Anybody else going to be in the ND badlands this weekend? This event has several distances from 5K up to the full 100 mile length of the Maah Daah Hey Trail. A good friend of mine attempted the 54 mile last year and DNF'd after 22 miles and this year he's going down to the 26 miler with me. He felt a little bad about that but I had to remind him: he hasn't yet completed 26 miles on that trail! No shame there as if he finishes that'll still be a PB for him out there.

My other friend who won last year's 5K is giving the 10K a pass and running the 1/2 marathon distance again fully unshod. I didn't realize until recently they had a Teddy Roosevelt impersonator handing out the awards and when he got his award for 1st Teddy pretended to shine his non-existent shoes!

If you're not going this year I'd really recommend it. It's still a pretty new, small event but just a magical place to run.
 
I'm proud of you. You'll soon be doing a 100-miler.

What distance are you trying for with this event?
 
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I'm proud of you. You'll soon be doing a 100-miler.

What distance are you trying for with this event?

Doing the 26 miler again. Gotta conquer that one first before moving up to longer distances! A 100 miler some day would be amazing. I actually started to see a bit how 100 miles could be possible running that 50K a few weeks ago. It's just a matter of taking your time and keeping a good balance of water, electrolytes and calories. Simple! Should be super easy ... [nervous laugh]
 
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